Payback and a Bottle of Merlot: Like Sisters Series Book One

by Bria Marche

  “Well anyway, he got such a kick out of that comment. It was the first time your dad laughed since he got home. Isn’t that wonderful, honey?”

  “What? Oh yeah, that’s great, Mom. I just remembered a call I have to make. It’s been good talking to you. I’ll call back before you guys leave for L.A. I love you.”

  “Okay, honey, I love you too, bye.”

  “Jeez, Mia… you didn’t hear a word she said.” Mia was angry with herself for zoning out on her mom like that, but seeing Aaron with that woman startled her into a deer in the headlights trance. What is Aaron up to, and who the hell is that woman? “That’s it! I’m not taking crap from anyone, not even Aaron.”

  Mia marched across the street, forgetting her bicycle, and entered Aaron’s store. The bell slammed against the ceiling from the impact of the door flying open. Mia heard voices in the back room. Aaron appeared around the corner, shocked to see her.

  “Mia!”

  “Hey, Aaron, what’s up?” she asked, with her head cocked and her hands firmly gripping her hips.

  “What are you doing here?”

  “It’s a public store, isn’t it?” A snarky, unfamiliar voice spewed from her mouth.

  “Well of course it is. I meant it’s so early, that’s all.”

  “Well, you’re open aren’t you? I need a telephoto lens, and I want your advice on what to buy.”

  “Sure, give me a second. I’ll be right back.”

  Aaron disappeared into the back room while Mia paced the floor with her jaws clenched. She heard voices again, then the sound of the back door opening and closing. Aaron reappeared with his typical smile which infuriated her even more. She wanted to slap his face.

  He’s up to something damn it and I want to know what it is. “Did I hear somebody back there with you?”

  “Oh, yeah… no big deal. So you want a telephoto lens, huh? They’re pretty expensive. Why do you need one anyway?”

  “Jeez, Aaron, I don’t know… because I’m a photographer.” He’s deliberately avoiding my question.

  “I’m only asking because I don’t stock many. If you want one for a decent price, we can look in the catalog, but I’d still have to order it. How soon do you need it?”

  “I need it right away. I thought you might have something in stock that would work.”

  “I do, but they’re expensive. If it’s for occasional use, why not borrow my setup? We can meet at my house during the lunch hour if you want to. I’ll show you what I have, then you can decide if it will work for you. I’ll even make lunch for us.”

  “That’s nice of you,” Mia said, softening up a bit. “Okay, it’s a deal. I’ll meet you at noon at your place. Thanks.”

  “Sure, Mia, anything for you.”

  Mia mindlessly walked out of habit toward the town square parking lot when she remembered she rode her bike into town. Damn it, I’m so distracted wondering who that woman was. It’s bugging the heck out of me, but I have to let it go. Aaron doesn’t owe me any explanations. It’s none of my business. Mia took a deep breath and shrugged her shoulders to relax and clear her head. She wanted to enjoy the scenery and the fresh air as she rode her bike home.

  Chapter Eighteen

  At home and relaxing on the patio with a Diet Coke, Mia took the time to call Karen. She wanted to catch up with her new friend.

  “Hi, Karen. I might get a chance to take close up shots of Jack and Sasha sooner than we thought. A friend of mine offered to loan me his camera and telephoto lens so I won’t need to order one. After I get his setup, we can start moving this plan along.”

  “That’s great. I can’t wait to see Jack’s face when this all goes down. It will be priceless.”

  “No kidding, right?”

  “So how was your trip to Florida? Will your dad be okay?”

  “Yes he will, thank goodness. My parents are going to stay in L.A. with my brother and his family for a few months. They’ll be in good hands, so that’s a relief. We’re still on for tomorrow at Hair Brained, right?”

  “Oh, for sure. I’ll see you in the morning. Later, Mia, bye.”

  “Bye, Karen.” Mia hung up and pulled out another icy Diet Coke from the refrigerator. She popped the top and grabbed the leash. “C’mon Reggie, let’s go for a walk.”

  A half hour into their neighborhood stroll, Mia checked her watch: 11:00 a.m. “We’ve got to get home.” She led him into a full run for the final few blocks to the house. They were exhausted by the time they reached the front door. Reggie plopped down on the foyer’s cool tile floor, and Mia stripped off her clothes as she headed down the hallway toward the shower. Looking a little nicer than usual was becoming important to her again. By eleven-fifty Mia was backing out of the driveway. It was an easy seven minutes by car to get to Oak Terrace Lane. Aaron sat on the front porch and watched as her black Camaro came down the street toward his house. He daydreamed about Mia constantly, but having her here, at his home, made the possibilities of them being together seem even more real.

  “Hey, gorgeous,” he called out from the porch, as she pulled into the driveway and stepped out of the car. He already had two cold glasses of fruit infused Sangria sitting on the table between the wicker rocking chairs.

  “Aaron, isn’t it a beautiful day? You must have gotten here early. You’ve already made Sangria, and it looks delicious.”

  “Sit down and relax. I know you love being out on the porch. I do too, it’s so peaceful and serene.”

  “Aaron, I need to be honest with you. This neighborhood, this house and this porch, are my favorite places in Tarrytown.”

  “It could all be yours, honey. Just say the word.”

  They looked at each other deeply. Their hearts and souls mingled for a moment. Mia’s eyes began to well up.

  “Mia? Why do you want this lens, and why is it so urgent? What do you need to see? Are you ready to talk and get what’s going on off your chest?”

  “Aaron, you’ve got to go back to work in an hour. You don’t have time to listen to my problems and you shouldn’t have to anyway.”

  “There’s something going on between you and Jack, and it isn’t good. It’s not that I’m happy about it, but you deserve so much better. The people who care about you know Jack isn’t good enough. He’d treat you like a queen if he really loved you. Instead, you spend most of your evenings alone. Where is Jack when he’s not with you? What is he doing… and with whom?”

  The glass of Sangria shook in Mia’s hand as she set it on the table. She sobbed with her head buried in her chest. Aaron jumped off his chair and knelt beside her. He wrapped his arms around her, holding her tightly. He stroked her golden hair and whispered in her ear. “It will be okay, I promise. Tell me what happened. I’ll protect you. You don’t need to cry over him, sweetheart.”

  “Aaron… I’m so stupid. He’s played me for so long, and I never realized it. I’ve wasted three years with him, and he was cheating on me from the beginning. I was blind to his lies. I wanted to believe our marriage could work, but it was doomed from the start. He didn’t think I would ever find out about his mistress. I saw them together at the train station, and I found emails between them going back years.”

  “Years?”

  “Yes… years.”

  “Here’s the real question, Mia. Have you confronted him?”

  “No, I have something better in mind, but I can’t tell you. I don’t want you talking me out of it.”

  “Does it have something to do with the telephoto lens?”

  “Yes,” she said, while digging through her purse for a tissue. “Aaron, I can’t hold you up. I’ll come in the store tomorrow, and you can show me the camera and lens. I’ve already taken too much of your time with my blabbering.”

  “Mia, I closed the shop for the day. I wasn’t planning to go back. I knew something was off and you needed to vent. I felt it this morning already.”

  Mia thought about Aaron’s comment, but didn’t respond. She was upset earlier at the came
ra shop, but it wasn’t because of Jack. For now, she would let it go. Aaron was consoling her about her problems. The last thing she wanted to do, was turn this mess around to be about him and the unknown woman he was with. There could be an innocent explanation.

  “Do you want to go inside and freshen up a little?” Aaron asked, when he noticed mascara running down Mia’s cheeks.

  “Sure. I just need a few minutes, then I’ll be okay. I’m sorry to put this on you. I couldn’t hold it back any longer.”

  “Come inside. Take your time. I’ll start lunch and we can talk some more if you want to.”

  Within ten minutes Mia came out of the bathroom, looking better. Aaron was outside arranging a beautiful place setting on the table. He had a gorgeous backyard with large oak trees shading the brick patio. His backyard was like an advertisement for a landscape design company. Everything was green, lush and perfect. No wonder Aaron was happy all the time. He had a thriving business, a beautiful home and yard in the most desirable area of Tarrytown, and very little drama to screw things up. He looked toward the house and saw Mia watching from the patio doors. The anguish and sadness was fading from her face. A smile took over, and she seemed happy.

  “There’s the Mia I love. Are you doing better now?”

  “I’m more composed, thanks. I was thinking about you. Now I know why you’re always happy.”

  “Really?”

  “Well sure. Your life is in place. Nothing is messed up. You own a wonderful business that you love. Look at this home, this yard. It’s pure bliss. It’s beautiful and peaceful. You’ve got it all.”

  “Mia, that’s not true… not yet anyway. I don’t have you. When the time is right, we’ll talk about this again. Right now, let’s enjoy lunch.”

  They ate their sandwiches and potato salad, enjoying every minute of it. They emptied the pitcher of Sangria in no time. Mia didn’t want to let go of the feeling she had right now. She felt lighter, happier and at peace. Aaron had that effect on her. He could make anyone happy. She didn’t want to talk about Jack anymore today. He wasn’t going to interfere with the wonderful day she was having with Aaron. Jack wasn’t going to rob her of another minute of happiness, ever again.

  After lunch, Aaron showed Mia the camera and telephoto lens. He paged through a photo album, pointing out the bird pictures he took last spring. Even high in the trees, the birds were crystal clear and detailed. This setup was perfect. Being a photographer had its advantages. Mia understood all the instructions of the camera and lens. Aaron assured her whatever pictures she planned to take, would turn out exactly how she wanted. And she could keep the camera and lens for as long as she needed them.

  It was four o’clock by the time Mia left to go home. Reggie needed to be fed and walked.

  “Aaron, thanks so much for today. Having you in my life means the world to me. Once I sort things out, we’ll talk more. No matter what, Jack will be history by the end of summer.” She gave Aaron that trademark wave and blew him a kiss. He stood on the porch watching as she drove away with his heart in her hands.

  ***

  Tuesday came, and the four friends congregated at Hair Brained to finalize their plan and to set it in motion. Vic poured the wine as Karen went over her idea with the girls. She’d hire a courier to deliver the certified letter to Sasha. It would congratulate Sasha on being one of the four finalists chosen from a group of her modeling peers. She would have a one in four chance to be the model on the cover of an inaugural glamour magazine. The letter said Sasha had three days to call and set up the appointment for her magazine cover photo shoot. Each model in the final four would get an entire day for themselves, including the hair and makeup for the cover shoot, plus, even more exciting, the photography would be shot by none other than Jasmine, the famous South American photographer.

  “She won’t be able to resist the offer,” Karen said, quite proud of her accomplishments. “Everything will look legitimate, especially since the posters will be on the window here at the salon. That will start a buzz in the modeling community that she’ll definitely hear about. And when the letter is hand delivered to her, it will seal the deal.”

  “We’ll post something on the blog that the final four have already been chosen, and the complimentary hair and makeup will be done right at our salon. It will be great publicity for us too. We’ll say that everything is hush-hush and the model chosen will only be known when the first edition comes out and her image is on the cover. That way nobody will know that it was just a hoax to begin with. There won’t be a magazine and Sasha won’t know if she would have been the winner or not. We’ll post on the blog a few months later, that we heard through the grapevine the magazine never went forward and nobody was ever chosen. It’s perfect! No harm, no foul. Plus we’ll have an entire day to pick Sasha’s brain with no interruptions,” Tina said, enthusiastically.

  “That’s perfect, Tina! Nobody will be the wiser. We won’t get in trouble and we’ll be able to find out everything we need to know from Sasha, especially after the wine starts flowing. We’ll cover the windows of the salon for the day so nobody sees her. That’s the only way to keep this under wraps. Do you guys think I should even use film in the camera? I mean why waste it?” Mia asked.

  “Well, it has to look legit and fashion photographers use film not digital cameras. So I guess we just need to go with it,” Karen suggested.

  “Yeah… for sure, plus it will give us something to laugh at when we look back at the crazy shit we pulled,” Vic said, with a toothy grin.

  “Okay… so we’re all in… right?” Mia asked, as she looked at each of her friends with a gleam in her eye.

  “We’re all in, let’s do it,” they agreed, with a group hug and a clink of their wine glasses.

  Now that the plan was solidly formed, the girls hung the posters on the front window of the salon. They decided to wait until Mia was able to get a few shots of Jack and Sasha together before they had the letter delivered to her apartment. They needed photos first, and Mia still had to follow Jack and find the opportunity to get those all-important shots.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Jack pulled the rubber band off the morning Wall Street Journal and unrolled it to read the front page news. He took a long absentminded sip of his black coffee, seeming to be engrossed in the headlines. Mia walked into the kitchen, allowing Jack the audience he wanted for his announcement. “I’m going to Chicago for a few days. It’s in the early stages, but it appears like the company is ramping things up for the big promotion I’ll be getting in a few weeks. Then I’ll be hitting the road, but that’s the price one has to pay to be a huge success like me. I’m going to be the National Sales Director. My life is going exactly the way I wanted it.”

  “I bet it is. Did they tell you the promotion was yours?” Mia asked, while pouring herself a cup of the black brew. She didn’t care what his response was, she just enjoyed making him squirm. She took advantage of any chance she could to knock Jack down from his high horse. He needed to see how totally unimpressed she was with anything he said, or did, lately.

  “Well not exactly.”

  “Well then, how exactly?”

  “Trust me, the promotion is mine. It’s in the bag.”

  Hmmm… trust you? That’s funny, you jerk, Mia thought.

  Jack went on with his boastful self-praise. “There’s nobody else as qualified as me anyway. The other sales managers are morons that got lucky to even be working at Plan-It Kidz. I, on the other hand, worked my way up the ladder through my ambition and intelligence.”

  Blah… blah… blah, she thought. “So when are you going to Chicago?”

  “I’m leaving after work next Wednesday and I’ll be back sometime Saturday. I’ll give you a call when I leave the city on Saturday so you’ll know when to pick me up at the train station.”

  “Sure, whatever. Don’t forget I’m staying overnight at the Boy Scout camp tonight. You need to get home on time. Reggie has to be fed and walked. The same goes fo
r tomorrow morning.”

  “Okay, I’m out of here,” Jack said, without acknowledging her comment. He glanced at his watch, gulped down his coffee and exited through the garage.

  “Good riddance. I’ll be watching you next Wednesday when you leave work. As a matter of fact, I have a great idea before that.” Mia decided to call Jack’s office and ask his secretary for Jack’s flight itinerary. She’ll say she plans to catch a later flight that day and surprise Jack with her arrival. They can make it a nice getaway in Chicago together. “What a great idea, if I do say so myself.” Mia created an event on her cell phone for next Wednesday to call Jack’s secretary just before the closing of business. That way, Abby, the secretary, wouldn’t have time to give Jack a head’s up that Mia called. Chances were, Jack wasn’t going anywhere to begin with. Mia could catch him in a fabricated story again while he enjoyed another romantic tryst with Sasha. Either way, Mia intended to capture some intimate and incriminating photos of them together. She already had the best camera equipment available to make that plan a perfectly photogenic reality.

  ***

  Today was one of Mia’s favorite yearly outings. She would spend the entire day and night with the Boy Scouts in Putnam Valley, and return home tomorrow around lunch time. There would be candid photos of the kids fishing and having tons of fun. They would build a campfire later when it got dark and sit around roasting hot dogs and making s’mores. Every year they told the same ghost stories which always unnerved the younger kids. The summer sleepover in the wilderness was the one event Mia always looked forward to. The photos, courtesy of Mia James, would appear in the Boy Scout’s summer newsletter.

  She finished her breakfast, packed sandwiches and a few Diet Cokes in the cooler, and gathered her camera equipment, pup tent and sleeping bag. A quick walk with Reggie and a shower, then she would be on her way. Mia decided to take State Highway 9 as her route to get to Putnam Valley today. She liked the drive along the Hudson River and all the diverse changes of scenery. It was a short drive, less than an hour, but beautiful and relaxing. This outing would be a good distraction. She could get her mind off her own problems, and have fun with the kids among the wildlife. Before she left, she called Jack’s secretary to have her remind Jack to come home right after work to care for Reggie. Mia wasn’t sure if she would have good cell reception out in the woods. Calling now would get her mind off Jack and his responsibilities so she could enjoy her time with the kids.